


Taxonomy

by djinnj



Category: Daredevil (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Werecreatures, Canon-Typical Violence, Canonical Character Death, Crack, Gen, Humor, some angst and violence in one part, werewolf adjacent
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-07
Updated: 2021-01-07
Packaged: 2021-03-18 05:13:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 4,305
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28612638
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/djinnj/pseuds/djinnj
Summary: Foggy is really, really mistaken about something. (It doesn't change much in the long run.)Chapter 1 is the main story and takes place Season 1 after the fight between Foggy and Matt but before the reconciliation. The other chapters are all just extra bits that did not fit into the main story. Cracky and mostly humor, except for the (very random) Karen extra which is canon level violent and angsty.Prompt: "Foggy's family are wizards/werewolves/something magical and no one else knows it at the start of the fic."  -- I took this a bit sideways.With thanks to my amazing beta who always comes through when I am a disaster.(Private in my head title: Nelson's Meatheads)
Comments: 13
Kudos: 11
Collections: DDE’s 2021 New Year’s Day Exchange





	1. Nelson's Meats (Theo, Foggy, and Anna Nelson; cracky)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [DJClawson](https://archiveofourown.org/users/DJClawson/gifts).



> I'm so sorry this is so late and so short! It was a bit of a departure for me and I had to rework the structure when I realized I could not write it as planned. That's also why there are those extra bits tacked on after the main story (Porterhouse was originally how the story was supposed to begin). They did not fit the new story but I was too attached to them to leave them off.

It was 7am on a Saturday and traffic on the GWB was more soul destroying than usual. Theo groaned as a port authority police car edged past, lights flashing, just as the little red accident icon popped up on his GPS. He suddenly deeply regretted not taking the Taconic, despite having had the same feeling in reverse about I-87 the last time he took the Taconic. He settled a little more comfortably into the van's driver seat and took a sip of his coffee, looking over at the sourpuss who had not said three words since he was picked up outside his apartment half an hour earlier.

"Might be here for a while," Theo said.

Foggy grunted, staring out the window but obviously not looking at the lanes of traffic filling in behind them.

"So glad you could make it, Foggy. You know, these drives upstate are a real bitch without company." He made his voice obnoxiously chipper as he continued, "'Happy to help, Theo, after all I owe you for that steak for Bess Mahoney.'" Foggy's mouth thinned. "'It's really great to have a chance to catch up since I haven't seen you since I got out of the hospital, which I didn't tell you all about until it was over, and you got to deal with Ma's complaining when I thought a phone call would be enough.'" 

"It was one night!" Foggy said, exasperated. "You didn't all have to descend on my apartment like I was dying."

"Like that matters to Ma." 

Foggy scrubbed at his face and Theo realized he was more frustrated than the teasing deserved. The question was whether to poke more and see what happened or let the poor guy off the hook.

"How's that fancy law firm you're spending all your time on, anyway? I didn't know lawyering had so much drywall."

"I don't want to talk about it."

"Are you handing out free bagels yet?"

"Why can't you be more like Marci? I can't talk about it!" 

"Wait, Marci? Your ex, that Marci?" Theo buried a snicker in his coffee cup at Foggy's sudden deer-in-headlights look. "How do you even know what she thinks? Holy shit, did you get back together?!"

"Y- NO! It's a-, you know, _casual!_ "

"Wow, didn't know you had it in you. I'm impressed. Never thought I'd see the day Foggy Nelson could be friends with bennies and mean it."

"Gross, dude, never use that phrase again." 

Theo laughed and let it drop. Foggy was finally talking so he hunted around for a safe topic. 

"So, how's Matt doing?"

Traffic improved from a halting snarl to an actual crawl at that moment. Theo focussed on the flow of vehicles as the three lanes merged into two to bypass a fender bender. He did not realize how silent Foggy had become until they had cleared the accident and passed the spaghetti of highway ramps and merges on the Jersey side. 

He glanced over and then snapped his eyes back to the road. Foggy was staring straight ahead looking like someone had stolen his dog. 

"Uh, Foggy? You okay?"

"I really shouldn't talk about it."

"This some work thing? Aren't family exempt or something?"

"Really? That is _not_ how attorney-client privilege works. It's not about a case anyway, not directly. It's just… personal, and I don't know what to do with it."

"Your supposed to be the smart one, just don't, you know, name names."

"Matt's been lying to me!" 

"Ooookay…?"

"This whole time I thought I knew him and he's been lying to me since the day we met."

"Shit, Foggy, what'd he do?" 

"And you know what's really rich, what's the icing on the freaking deception cake? He said I keep secrets too and he thought I'd understand. And it's not even true! On what planet is our family werewolves!" Theo thought his brain had glitched; he could not have heard that right. "Mind you, it would be awesome if we were werewolves; Brett's great uncle was a weretiger and I wanted to be exactly like him when I was five. But that's not even the point! The point is that Matt has been keeping things from me and then he makes up some bogus reason I would do the same to him. Which I would not, thank you very much!"

"Uh, Foggy?"

"What?!"

"Our family _is_ werewolves."

"Oh great, did he get to you? Is this some kind of joke to him? Not funny, Theo!"

Theo was really glad they had left the worst of the traffic behind them so he could focus on his tragically misinformed eldest sibling, which, how was that even possible?

"How do you miss Pop spending three days a month in his shed? He built a shed on the roof of the building, Foggy!"

"Woodworking! That's his man-cave where he can revisit the glory days of when he still worked with Uncle Timmy at Nelson's Hardware! TV, minifridge, and power tools. He's a walking cliche!"

"Candace going off every month?"

"She's allowed to have friends, Theo. And you know the compulsive moon change thing is bogus anyway. If you wanted to convince me, you wouldn't be playing into millenia of misconceptions in Were biology."

"Riiiiight. So what about the _special_ special orders at the shop?"

"So you have a large Were clientele; that doesn't mean our family is Were. Brown paper packages tied up with string don't have to be your favorite things in order to sell them."

"Uncle Timmy talked about it at Easter!"

"Everyone has an uncle who tells sketchy jokes; it's generational and he's not _actually_ anti-Were." 

Theo wondered how unsafe it would be if he slammed his forehead repeatedly into the steering wheel. 

"Seriously? Ma never pulled you aside for a talk about this? She explained it to me when I was eleven! It's not even a huge secret!"

"Oh and she would tell you but not me? Pop and I had the talk, buddy, and it's the one everyone has. Come on, Theo, you're putting a lot of effort into a very bad joke."

Theo tapped his cell. "Call Mom." He put it on speaker, the ringing tinny.

"You cannot be serious." Foggy said right as the call connected.

 _"Theo? Everything alright? You're not at Swenson's already?"_

"Hey Ma, everything's fine; we're still on the road. Foggy's here," he paused fractionally to let Foggy's _hi, Ma_ get through, before he continued. "We were having an argument. I told Foggy we had the talk about being a werewolf family when I was eleven, and he said I was older." Theo rolled his eyes as Foggy mugged at him.

_"Oh, no you were eleven same as Foggy. He might have been remembering when Uncle Timmy told Sammy. He waited until he was almost twelve because that's the same year we told you and Candace, Foggy. You know how bad Sammy is at keeping a secret, not that it's really a secret, but you know how it is when you want kids to be careful about what they say and where they say it. The three of you have always been good about that; Sammy not so much, and you never know when people are going to be cruel to kids about these things. It's a good thing he was a late bloomer so it was alright to wait, not like with Cand--."_

"Thanks Ma!" Theo jumped in before she could get into details he really did not want to hear. "That makes sense. I'll call you when we get there." 

_"You boys drive safe! Don't forget the sandwiches Pop made for you. And there's an extra thermos of coffee. I almost didn't pack it. I know how you don't like to have to make lots of stops, Theo, but then I thought you might need it, Foggy, with getting up earlier than you're used to."_

"Thanks Ma," they chorussed before Theo disconnected the call. "You'd think we were driving to Maine with everything she packed," he added. Foggy's face was screwed up like the time he had mixed up where he had put the jalapeno gum and got it himself instead of Sam. "Now do you believe me?"

"What the fuck, Theo?" Foggy's rapidly increasing volume also translated into wider and more emphatic gestures. Theo was glad they were in the van where there was the room for it. "What the actual fuck?! How did I miss this? The elephant in the room is a werewolf and apparently I'm the last one to know? Despite being told? Am I going to sprout mysterious body hair and become a basketball prodigy? Is Pop suddenly going to show up in glasses and a cardigan over fur and tell me about how my body is changing again?" Theo could hear the seat belt catch every time Foggy bounced around.

"Foggy, quit referencing that old Teen Wolf movie. It's puberty, you know that. That's why they told us when we were eleven. What I want to know is what the hell was the talk you two had, because it wasn't the same conversation."

"Oh, oh nooo…" Foggy moaned and put his face in his hands, muffling himself. "I must have thought he was talking about sex and stuff and we had that special class at school...." Theo could not help it and started to laugh. Foggy's hands flew out again like he was gesturing at an exhibit. "I mean, school mentioned Were stuff, but I didn't know it was personally relevant! Oh my God, my life is a lie."

"You're such a drama queen."

"Are you a werewolf? Is Ma? Fuck, what about Candace's kids? I haven't done one of those square things since high school bio." 

"We're inactive, genius; like you I got it from Dad. Sean has weredeer way back somewhere, but he doesn't have the gene. If that casual thing with Marci turns into something permanent, you might want to let her know." Foggy made a face.

"Uncle Timmy?"

"Inactive, and Aunt Jean, too, but Sam, yes." 

"Fuck, how did I miss this?"

"We all thought you knew and were just really good at talking around it!"

"Well I didn't! And now Matt's figured it out before I did."

"It's not like we keep it secret in the family; I guess everyone thought you told him. He probably heard one of us talking about it and didn't assume it was a joke." Foggy's face fell. "Hey, Fogs, is it really bad, what he lied about?"

"I can't talk about it," he said, miserably. 

"No, but you can tell me if it's bad. Like, is he lying about something he did? 'Cause we've known him longer than Sean, and if he's not a really bad liar that's going to screw with my whole world view."

"It's more a… lie of omission. And it's... important?" Foggy sighed. "It's really personal, Theo."

"Like on the scale of not telling someone your family has werewolves? Or more on the scale of not telling someone you're a serial killer?"

"He is _not_ a serial killer, oh my God."

"How do you know that? You just said he's been lying to you all these years." 

"You're impossible."

"Hey, if you want us to, we'll kick him to the curb. But you're gonna have to tell Ma he's not invited to Christmas and Easter anymore, and you know she won't take 'I can't talk about it.' You need to have a story straight."

"I don't _want_ to kick him to the curb! I'm just mad, okay? I thought he was someone else and I'm not sure how I feel about the new guy."

"So, what's the new guy like?" 

"Arrogant, full of himself, takes on too much, thinks he has to fix everything, has a boner for justice." Foggy huffed in frustration.

"Uh."

"What."

"Well."

" _What?_ "

"Are you sure he's not the same guy? 'Cause he kinda sounds like the same guy."

"What?"

"Full of himself, thinks he has to fix everything, boner for justice? He convinced you to leave that shiny law firm for a rat hole in Hell's Kitchen."

"He's angry, okay. He's just really, _really_ angry, and I don't like it."

"Hey, he's not, like, taking things out on you, is he? 'Cause that's not cool."

"Argh! No! He's not! He's keeping things from me, okay? That's the problem!" Theo rubbed his nose and Foggy rolled his eyes. "What now?"

"Look, I don't know what's going on with you guys and you can't tell me, but you're mad he's keeping secrets and then you're mad at what the secrets are. So, maybe that's why he's keeping them? Are you sure he's not just embezzling?"

"There's nothing _to_ embezzle. Putz. He's jeopardizing the whole law firm, his career, mine, on this crusade he has."

"Shit, maybe you shouldn't work with him."

"Which I would have known if he hadn't lied to me!"

Theo suddenly felt out of his depth. It was one thing to tease Foggy or even to tell him when he was being an idiot, but even without knowing the particulars Theo knew his brother had accrued a lot of debt going to law school. Idealism was all well and good, but things looked different when the rent was due.

They were silent for a long time, Theo changing lanes occasionally and Foggy staring unseeing out the window. It was pretty enough; the drive upstate in late spring was not as impressive as 'leaf peeping' season, but traffic was better and all that green was still a change from the city. 

They made it all the way to the Swenson's farm, up the long drive to the processing building and parked, before Foggy broke the silence.

"Thanks."

"What, for ragging on you all morning?"

"For letting me talk about it. I really needed to, I don't know, hear it out loud."

"You gonna be okay with Matt?"

"I don't know, but I think it's worth giving him a chance."

"Well, that's good. Christmas wouldn't be the same without him. Now, get your ass in gear. 200 pounds of emu steaks aren't going to move themselves, and I need to talk to Swenson about another special order from Mr Francis. Oh, and call Ma."

"Aye aye, captain!"


	2. Charismatic Megafauna (Karen Page, James Wesley; canon-typical violence and angst)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It's _that_ scene.

The taste of chloroform was heavy in Karen's throat and her heartbeat was pounding in her head as James Wesley monologued across from her. He had stroked her hair in a parody of solicitude when he put her back in the chair and she had not even been able to vomit on the fucker's expensive suit. 

The gun, the pointless call-response (she lied, she already knew the city was _hers_ in a way no other place had been; it _mattered_ to her), and more monologuing; she felt like a prey animal, frozen in her own body while he menaced her for the fun of it. She hated this. And why was it always drugs? Well, if there was one thing she knew by now, it was the limits of her own body while impaired. So she listened and tried to flex her toes.

He knew about their visit to St Benezet. He knew about Ben. She silently sent a fervent apology to Ben into the ether; she had miscalculated and it was going to get them killed. (At home on his computer, Ben Urich got a shiver up the back of his neck and decided to set in motion certain precautions.)

But Fisk was still in the dark and Wesley was that smooth kind of overconfident that made her teeth itch. What kind of bastard left a loaded gun on a table when threatening someone? She curled her fingers, the feeling slowly returning. She engaged, pushed him to talk more, to reveal more because he thought she was small and helpless, and all the while her hands were warming up and her reflexes steadying. He was narrating a horror show and she let all its vile import appear on her face for him to see.

The cell phone ring tone was like a clarion. She leapt forward, the table flung aside by the sudden bulk of her body and the gun lost in the shadows. He staggered back, the chair clattering to the ground as he somehow managed not to fall. She kicked out once with a foreleg and it was over. 

Towering over his empty body, she lifted her head high and breathed, feeling the last of the drug dissipate into her larger form. She scented the air and listened carefully as the cell continued to ring. No one else. 

She picked her way over to her handbag before transforming again. A hysterical laugh wanted to bubble up as she remembered that last look on James Wesley's face, the look that said he had not expected to be confronted with a full grown Eurasian Elk cow. ( _Moose_ , Kevin's whisper in her head would always, always tease). She gulped down a fresh wave of nausea; blunt force trauma had erased that look definitively. 

She tugged her blazer straight and looked around one last time, checking that the table was clean of hairs and that her bag still had everything, before rushing away as fast as she could. She had another ghost to add to her nightmares.


	3. Porterhouse (Foggy, Theo, and Anna Nelson; silly)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> They like meat even more than usual in this AU.

"Brother mine, have you the forbidden meat!" The door swung closed behind Foggy and Theo briefly wished he could have left it locked despite the late lunch rush.

"Do you even hear yourself sometimes?" 

"Well, do you have it? I have to go bribe a cop."

"Seriously, Foggy?" 

_"Is that Foggy?"_ Ma's voice came from the back, just before she appeared in person, walking around to give him a hug. "Louie had a pipe crack or something; Pop's next door lending him the big wrench. You're very handsome today."

"Why thank you, Ma! I've got a cop to bribe and a real estate agent to impress!"

"She must be pretty."

Theo rolled his eyes as he went to the case and pulled out a wrapped parcel, brown paper, butcher's twine, the whole nine yards, and put it in a handled shopping bag (no logo). "One dry aged two-inch porterhouse." He held it over the counter but pulled it away briefly before letting Foggy grab it. "You know Mrs Mahoney would be happy with chuck steak, right? She does that amazing sweet smokey overnight marinade with the chili peppers?"

"Indeed I do, Theo, but Brett likes strip steak, and this way I have plausible deniability!"

"I don't think there's any denying happening if you announce you're bribing a cop to everyone you see."

"Whatever, Mrs Mahoney deserves nice things, and this steak is very nice. You know she'd never buy something like this for herself. Let her live a little!"

"Why aren't you giving Bess a proper three-inch porterhouse, Foggy?" Ma asked, because of course she did. 

"Don't bother trying to convince him, Ma; he's walking around joking about bribes but he's got some weird ethical thing about too big a steak."

"Hey, a two-inch steak is a charming and delightful treat. A three-inch steak is an obligation! I don't want her to feel weird about accepting it."

"Yeah, yeah. So today's the day?"

"I think it is, Theo! I really think this place is gonna be it, Ma. Nelson and Murdock, attorneys at law, at your service! Now I just need to catch Brett before his shift; he's on a 4-to-12 this week." Foggy bounced toward the door, pulling out his cell phone as he went. 

"Don't forget you owe me for that steak!" Theo said just as Ma said "And go next door to say 'hello' to your father!" 

"Thanks, Theo! Will do, Ma!" A wave and he was gone. 

Theo looked over at Mrs Alsteade who had watched all this bemused. 

"Ma wanted him to be a butcher."

"It's no being a butcher, but the suits are nice," said Ma.


	4. The Talk (Edward and Foggy Nelson, age 11; slight awkwardness)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> All in all it worked out okay, but it's a good thing Anna was the one to talk to Theo.

Foggy was listening to his _Into the Woods_ CD again. He was hopping around his and Theo's bedroom with grand hand gestures while trying to deepen his voice and cover both princes' parts. Ed took a deep breath.

"Hey kiddo, can we talk about something important?" 

Foggy shut off the player and they settled next to each other on his bed. 

"Sure, Pop, what is it?" 

"You're eleven now and it's about time you and I had a talk about what that means. For you, I mean. There's some things you need to know." Maybe he should have practiced this part. 

Foggy scrunched up his eyebrows, suspicious. "Like what?" 

"Well, you're growing up and that can be kind of complicated. And I wanted to let you know I'm here if you need to talk about anything, about how your body's changing and what that means. We're a little different, you know?"

"Ohhhhh," Foggy said, "Is this about the same thing Ma talked to Candace about? Only, you know, not, because she's Candace and I'm me."

"Yes!" Ed said. Of course he had figured it out; Foggy was always a sharp one. Or maybe Candace told him after her conversation with Anna that morning. He was relieved it was not a surprise. Not that he thought Foggy would be horrified, but it was still a shock to learn you have Weres in the family, that your own dad and sister were werewolves. He remembered when his own father had told him. Which reminded him to get on with it. "It's something I live with, but you're gonna have it easier since you're inactive. You still might notice some things, though. Things might get… sensitive or uncomfortable, or even hurt sometimes. But it's all normal and it'll get better as you get older."

Foggy's whole face screwed up and he looked very unimpressed. "I know, Pop. They told us about it at school during health."

Well, that was a relief. He and a few other parents had spoken out at school board meetings about adding basic Were biology to the magical puberty section of the curriculum. It was reassuring to know the changes were helping his kids. He would have to ask Candace more about it some time since she would start feeling the urge to shift soon.

"It's going to be a lot harder for your sister to adjust, so be kind to her, okay?"

"Okay, I guess." Foggy seemed to be turning a thought around his big head. "Hey Pop, it doesn't sound like much fun the way you're talking about it. But it's a good thing, right? Like, at school they're all don't be ashamed, but be safe and respectful, and you're saying you live with it, but isn't it kinda nice, too?" 

He had the best, sweetest boy on the planet, an absolute star.

"Yeah, Foggy, it's nice. It's pretty terrific sometimes. But, you got to be careful who you share it with, you know. Not everyone's so nice about it. Look at that show you're listening to and how mean and cruel even something you like can be about it. And it's not always intentional, sometimes people are careless and don't realize what they say hurts." He tugged him over for a one armed hug. "Just, you know, this is something to trust friends with, not just anybody. Okay?"

"Okay, Pop!"

"You want to see if your Ma will let us cut into the strawberry poke cake yet?"

"Yeah!" Foggy jumped up and was out of the room like a shot, shouting for Theo. Ed laughed and followed more slowly. That had gone really well.


	5. A note on Weres (pseudoscience and handwaving)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> How I decided it works. There's more magic in this AU than this suggests, but it's so subtle that it's probably enough to just know it exists.

In this AU, being a Wereanimal is a recessive trait (carriers may be colloquially referred to as "inactive"). Wereanimals can only be placental mammals; there are no werefish, -reptiles, or -birds, but also no weremarsupials or -monotremes. Extinct mammals, however, are possible, so while weredinosaurs cannot occur, weremammoths are at least theoretically possible. The conservation of mass is magically not relevant. 

There is one disputed case from the 1860s of a French "werewere", a human who transforms into a bodily different human with different human abilities. There is considerable skepticism regarding the validity of the case study; current scientific theory inclines towards Dissociative Identity Disorder as a more likely scenario. The main objection being that the personhood of a Were is the same regardless of form, while the case study could not definitively prove that the human bodies were, in fact, two separate forms rather than two identities in the same form. Regardless of its veracity, the highly sensationalized reporting around the case study is believed to be one of the inspirations for Stevenson's _Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde_ (1886).

Transformation is voluntary and not tied to any particular time or event, although there are often associated secondary characteristics. These secondary characteristics are tied to groupings of genes other than the recessive triggering gene, and influence the actual animal that the transformation will confer. This is why some Were characteristics (the ability to identify certain olfactory markers regardless of state, for example, although the ability may be reduced in human form due to the limitations of biology) are heritable even if the individual is not a Were or even a carrier themselves. The actual degree of influence of these characteristics on behavior is hotly contested. Secondary behavioral effects such as an inclination for isolation approximately three days every month is believed to be what gave rise to folklore tying the moon to werewolf transformation. Nonetheless, there is no conclusive proof of nature versus nurture for many culturally significant behaviors. 

Being a Were is less common than being left handed (~10%), but more common than being red headed (1-2%), and tends to cluster in social enclaves.

All this changes surprisingly little in the world.


End file.
